JPR Music

Live Session Archive

10:56 am

Mon July 14, 2014

The band's story started in 2007, when Chris Funk gathered local musicians he admired for a chance to write music and play instruments he wasn't utilizing in his role as guitarist for The Decemberists. He pulled in fellow Decemberists Nate Query and Jenny Conlee, on bass and accordion, Annalisa Tornfelt on fiddle, and Jon Neufeld on guitar. In 2012, Decemberists drummer John Moen joined in, too. Their only ambition was to have fun, and their all-acoustic instrumentation meant they could hold practices in each other's living rooms. But ideas started sparking immediately -- they were pushing their own musicianship and the conventions of their instruments, and could hear a new brand of Americana music burbling up.

Recordings

10:26 am

Tue July 1, 2014

Ralph J. Gleason was the San Francisco Chronicle’s Jazz and Rock critic in the 1960s, and I learned a lot from his columns. At the end of his thrice-weekly observations and reviews, he’d run a list

of upcoming shows in the Bay Area. The bands seemed fascinating; names like Grateful Dead or Country Joe and the Fish signaled something fresh going on. The longest name was Charlie Musselwhite’s South Side Sound System, and I wondered what kind of music the man with the odd name made, and where in San Francisco was the South Side. Daly City?

Live Session Archive

9:51 am

Tue June 24, 2014

Trevor Hall realized at a very young age that music was more than just a passion. As an eleven year old, playing harmonica beside his father in the cradle of the weeping willows of South Carolina, music quickly became his most intimate companion, guide and creative outlet. In his elementary years, he began to write his own songs and perform them locally.

Upcoming JPR Music Special

12:45 pm

Fri June 20, 2014

Amy LaVere was born in a small Texas/Louisiana border town, nurtured by musical parents with a passion for traditional country. Her family moved 13 times by the time she entered high school, ultimately landing in Detroit where Amy fronted the punk band Last Minute while still in her teens. From there, her musical journey became a wild ride of travels.

Live Session Archive

5:20 pm

Tue June 17, 2014

Nobody expected Lily & Madeleine’s first original song, “In the Middle,” to rack up a half a million YouTube views. The Internet is obsessed with what’s new and what’s next, the fads and memes of viral culture, and so it would have to seem a little incongruous for social networks and content aggregators to embrace gimmick-free, black-and-white footage of an unplugged duo crooning a bittersweet and understated melody.

Live Session Archive

4:29 pm

Sat June 14, 2014

It may have been 15+ years – from roots in rural Nebraska, through time in ‘Music City’ Nashville, TN, and to the current day relocated to a new home in cosmopolitan Spain – but it seems that the song spirits have been constant companions for Josh Rouse.

Live Session Archive

3:15 pm

Thu May 29, 2014

The Show Ponies are an indie-folk outfit from Los Angeles with old time and country influences. Their new album, We’re Not Lost, is proof of the rewards of taking a leap of faith. Funded entirely by crowdsourcing, the album is a realization of both their ardent fan base, and the power of setting a goal and trusting the process. What they’re moving toward is becoming one of the hottest Old-Time groups on of the West Coast, with a stellar sophomore album that flirts effortlessly with a modern new-roots sound and a hard driven progressive beat.

Live Session Archive

11:35 am

Fri May 23, 2014

Jillian Rae is a multi-talented violinist, lead vocalist, and songwriter whose creative and dynamic style of violin playing, along with her lifelong experience as a performer, lend her an assured stage presence. She has an innate ability to create hook-laden tunes affirming the positives of life in the face of struggle and disappointment.

Live Session Archive

9:27 am

Fri May 2, 2014

Nathan and Rebecca Bliss, the voices and the brains behind Barnaby Bright, are truly the modern day traveling troubadours, averaging roughly 200 shows and 40,000 miles traveled a year. You can find them on streets as far away as London or Amsterdam, and as remote as St. Paris, Ohio, toting their massive haul of instruments: multiple guitars, harmonium, banjo, ukulele, floorboard bass, thumb pianos and keyboards.

Live Session Archive

3:03 pm

Tue April 29, 2014

Just in case you aren’t familiar with Béla Fleck, there are many who say he’s the premiere banjo player in the world. Others claim that Béla has virtually reinvented the image and the sound of the banjo through a remarkable performing and recording career that has taken him all over the musical map and on a range of solo projects and collaborations.

Live Session Archive

1:56 pm

Wed April 23, 2014

Rolling Stone has compared Sarah Jarosz to Gillian Welch; Mojo labeled her a “newgrass prodigy” for her skills on banjo, guitar and mandolin; and the normally reserved New York Times hailed her as “one of acoustic music’s finest talents,” with songwriting chops to match her instrumental prowess.

Live Session Archive

9:30 am

Tue April 15, 2014

With over 2 million views on Youtube, a 2013 European Blues award, and named Best Solo Performer at the Memphis Blues Challenge, the entire world is now discovering Matt Andersen. A powerhouse performer with a giant soul-filled voice and commanding stage presence, Matt has built a formidable following the old fashioned way - touring the world and letting the converted audiences and Andersen devotees spread his reputation through word of mouth.

Live Session Archive

1:31 pm

Fri April 4, 2014

Wild Child’s founding members Kelsey Wilson and Alexander Beggins first met in 2009 while touring with a Danish act called The Migrant. Both call Texas home: Wilson, a classically-trained violinist who wrote her first songs under the wing of legendary country music outlaw Ray Wiley Hubbard, hails from the fabled bluegrass circles of Wimberly; and Beggins, a ukulele player from Houston, was finishing up at The University of Texas while on the that tour.

Recordings

11:27 am

Mon March 31, 2014

I read somewhere recently that music flowed from Franz Schubert’s pen as naturally as rain falls from the clouds. Such a fitting analogy. Not just because he was one of the most prolific composers in history, but also because he used rain and water so often in his lieder (poetry written by others that he set to music). He’s not the only one, of course.

Live Session Archive

4:38 pm

Fri March 28, 2014

Before signing with New West Records in early 2011, country songwriter Robert Ellis made a name for himself in Houston, Texas. Inspired by the country, folk, and bluegrass records he’d heard while growing up in southern Texas, Ellis began playing shows around the city, eventually landing a Wednesday night residency at a local venue called Fitzgerald’s.

Live Session Archive

2:35 pm

Fri March 28, 2014

Grammy winner and 7 time Grammy nominee Paula Cole has released six solo albums spanning an eighteen year career. She has sold approximately three million albums and has performed with icons in many genres of music from Peter Gabriel to Dolly Parton (and many more.) Cole’s poetic, touching, and intelligent writing makes her stand apart. Her compositions have been covered by Herbie Hancock, Annie Lennox, Katherine McPhee to name a few.